The last Heart of the Swarm battle was between era-defining superstars.

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At the close of this year’s Blizzcon, the last StarCraft II: Heart of the Swarm tournament was to be a battle between era-defining superstars. For those who follow StarCraft, the final was on the level of a Barcelona vs. Manchester United cup final or an Ali-Frazier duel, where the cold math and ironclad rules of the game gave way to a contest of wills and personality.

Last year's Blizzcon champion—Lee "Life" Seung Hyun—once again managed an unlikely tournament run to make it to the final of the year-long championship, reminding people why he is perhaps the most "clutch" player in StarCraft. He's not necessarily the best player, nor the most strategically insightful or creative—and he's rarely a dominant force in the sport. Other players often spend an entire year owning the competitive circuit with brilliant, innovative play.

But if Life can make it into the bracket stage of a major tournament, when the pressure is at its highest and the crowds are at their largest, clearly his skills are greater than the sum of their parts. With a mixture of daring and unnerving insight into his opponents, Life is a force to be reckoned with in tournaments. This year, he had the chance to become the first back-to-back winner in WCS history, a staggering feat given how long a year is in a StarCraft career.

His opponent, sOs, is cut from a similar cloth. He was Life's immediate predecessor as Blizzcon champion, back in 2013, where he broke the crowd's heart with a victory over the ageing StarCraft and Brood War legend, Jaedong. He's got a knack for winning the big tournaments: his $100,000 (£66,000) Blizzcon victory was followed, a few months later, by another $100,000 victory at the Intel Extreme Masters championship in Katowice, Poland.

The most dangerous thing about sOs is that, while he can play the technically demanding, complex "standard" forms of StarCraft, he has absolutely no scruples about doing less well-regarded, screwball strategies that are high-risk and high-reward. He is as happy winning a tournament looking like a world-class superstar as he is looking like a troll on the lowest ranking public StarCraft servers. Nobody is ever sure what they’re going to get from a meeting with sOs.

Finals like this don’t happen often in competitive gaming—it's too unpredictable, too random. Like professional football, a lot of things have to go right outside of pure performance for players to make it to the final, meaning it's often hard to get evenly matched opponents.

Life vs. sOs was something different, though—and it was something that StarCraft sorely needed.

Lessons learned

StarCraft II is entering its third and final era with the release of Legacy of the Void, an expansion that brings (mostly) to a close the saga that began back in 1998. Since StarCraft II came out in 2010, the game has had some significant ups and downs. The first StarCraft II game, Wings of Liberty, combined with the rise of cheap, high-quality streaming services to create a breakthrough moment for e-sports. For a moment, it seemed like StarCraft would be the competitive game to define an era.

This was not to be. StarCraft II was swiftly overtaken in popularity by free-to-play MOBAs like League of Legends and Dota 2—which was made all the worse by the release of Heart of the Swarm, the first SC2 expansion pack. While there were issues that bothered fans in the original version of StarCraft II, Heart of the Swarm introduced a number of new units that had the effect of making the game boring and frustrating to players and spectators.

From 2013 into early 2015, StarCraft II became a shadow of its former self. Legacy of the Void was on the way, but would anyone still care? Last year, when the game was playable on the show floor of Blizzcon, dozens of PC terminals sat empty, even at the height of the show. There were no lines and no interest from an audience that had moved on to games like Heroes of the Storm and Overwatch. StarCraft was a relic from a bygone age of PC gaming. Until the final day of the World Championship Series (WCS) 2014 tournament, the arena was half-empty, the best players in the world competing in front of a listless crowd.

StarCraft II has one final chance to make a good impression, to remind people what was so exciting about it when it emerged on the scene in 2010. Heart of the Swarm was eventually fixed, though perhaps too late to salvage its reputation amongst fans. That was the big question heading into Blizzcon, ahead of the release of Legacy of the Void: was it already too late for StarCraft?

This is literally the exact definition of something that is not a sport. The word sport exists to delineate those activities from things like watching TV or playing video games.

What constitutes a sport though? By no sane definition could a bunch of over-paid and questionably dressed twits taking 3 or 4 tries at whacking a tiny ball into a hole 300 yards away be reasonably considered to be a sport, but yet Golf is a sport.

Arguably there is less physical activity in some accepted sports, such as Snooker or Darts, than there is in the frantic key presses and constant unblinking attention required to compete in a StarCraft tournament. And there is definitely an equal level of skill and dedication.

eSports should probably be thought of in the same manner as professional Chess e.g. A Mind Sport. Just because the game doesn't have hundreds of years of history behind it, it doesn't make it any less valid.

Still, if we are calling things not a sport because we don't like them then add Golf to the list. F*** them and their silly trousers.

This is literally the exact definition of something that is not a sport. The word sport exists to delineate those activities from things like watching TV or playing video games.

I agree that this isn't a sport. However, there is no possible definition of "a sport" that excludes Starcraft and includes everything that is a sport.

Requires extreme physical skill to compete at the highest levels? Check.Requires long, hard hours of training and practice, dwarfing the amount of work regular people do and taking over professional's lives? Check.Top players able to play at levels far exceeding what a normal person can manage? Check.Benefits from physical fitness? Check.

The list goes on and on. At some point, either one has to exclude most sports from the definition (which I'm ok with, my favourite definition for sport is "direct physical contest between opposing players or teams"- excluding track & field, golf, motorsport, Starcraft, etc), or they have to just give up and say "yeah, ok, it's a sport".

My question is, why would physical prowess in the form of endurance or power qualify, but prowess in the form of manual dexterity or mental acuity not?What is so special about one and not the other?(Less flashy or obvious on the screen or what?)

FYI my definition of sport is: An activity that conforms to an arbitrary set of rules for no good reason, that allows for competition between two or more entities based on a specific skill or skill-set(which can be physical or mental).I remember a TB rant on exactly that topic.Actually here it is: Ding

This is literally the exact definition of something that is not a sport. The word sport exists to delineate those activities from things like watching TV or playing video games.

What constitutes a sport though? By no sane definition could a bunch of over-paid and questionably dressed twits taking 3 or 4 tries at whacking a tiny ball into a hole 300 yards away be reasonably considered to be a sport, but yet Golf is a sport.

Arguably there is less physical activity in some accepted sports, such as Snooker or Darts, than there is in the frantic key presses and constant unblinking attention required to compete in a StarCraft tournament. And there is definitely an equal level of skill and dedication.

eSports should probably be thought of in the same manner as professional Chess e.g. A Mind Sport. Just because the game doesn't have hundreds of years of history behind it, it doesn't make it any less valid.

Still, if we are calling things not a sport because we don't like them then add Golf to the list. F*** them and their silly trousers.

I think e-sports are far too physical to be compared to chess or described as 'mind sport'. It's clearly closer to golf and snooker and you're correct 100% about that.

I love plaxing games. I especially love Blizzard games (/played on the alt of my alt in WoW is 231 days). But this is ridiculous. [...]When you stop playing and start watching, you lose the fun from a sport.

I quite disagree. I have probably 20x (if not even more) as much time spent watch Korean pro scene in StarCraft 2 than actual time playing the game (and I'm pretty rubbish at it anyway).

I find watching the shows like GSL, ProLeague, StarLeague, and the current DreamHack tournament for example more fun than playing the game. It shows tactics and plays I will NEVER ever manage to pull off, and with good commentators it really brings interest (and sometimes really good fun, look at the French casters from the Nation Wars III) and the comments point out things I would have most likely missed.

Funny thing is people always look at me like a massive nerd and weirdo to spend lunch breaks (GSL/ProLeague/StarLeague often start at 6:30pm which is 11:30am for me, perfect for lunch time ) or time in the evening watching streams and VODs of such tournaments. Yet people find it absolutely normal to spend the whole week-end watching football, Rolland Garros, or whatever other sport available on TV.

This is literally the exact definition of something that is not a sport. The word sport exists to delineate those activities from things like watching TV or playing video games.

The invention of the word "sport" predates TV or video games, so that's a pretty specious argument.

I personally like using the "risk of life and limb" rule of sport versus games. However, that seems to piss off just as many people, because baseball, soccer, etc. are under that definition, merely games, not sports.

More on topic, where can I go watch these games? Is there a YouTube/Twitch video of them? I don't watch much, but I'd enjoy watching the elite go to town.

I was a fanatical Star Craft player back in the day - even cracking the top 10 ladder rankings before they opened up the US servers to the global audience and the Koreans came in and kicked all our butts.

I was never able to put the time in to get even decent at Star Craft II, or follow it much, but I found this line interesting:

Quote:

Heart of the Swarm introduced a number of new units that had the effect of making the game boring and frustrating to players and spectators.

Can anyone (author?) explain which units these were and how they made the game boring? Or perhaps point me in the direction of a resource? I'm curious.

This is literally the exact definition of something that is not a sport. The word sport exists to delineate those activities from things like watching TV or playing video games.

The invention of the word "sport" predates TV or video games, so that's a pretty specious argument.

I personally like using the "risk of life and limb" rule of sport versus games. However, that seems to piss off just as many people, because baseball, soccer, etc. are under that definition, merely games, not sports.

More on topic, where can I go watch these games? Is there a YouTube/Twitch video of them? I don't watch much, but I'd enjoy watching the elite go to town.

The "it's not a sport" and "watching instead of playing doesn't make sense" crowds never give up, do they.

Quote:

Can anyone (author?) explain which units these were and how they made the game boring? Or perhaps point me in the direction of a resource? I'm curious.

The biggest offender by far was the swarm host (zerg), which spawned long-lived free units leading to wars of attrition that made the games terribly slow-paced. They went as far as anticipating a redesign that had been planned for Legacy of the Void to fix the issue.

This is literally the exact definition of something that is not a sport. The word sport exists to delineate those activities from things like watching TV or playing video games.

The invention of the word "sport" predates TV or video games, so that's a pretty specious argument.

I personally like using the "risk of life and limb" rule of sport versus games. However, that seems to piss off just as many people, because baseball, soccer, etc. are under that definition, merely games, not sports.

More on topic, where can I go watch these games? Is there a YouTube/Twitch video of them? I don't watch much, but I'd enjoy watching the elite go to town.

If you google Life vs SoS, you should get the VODs for this match. ESL's starcraft twitch channel(ESL_sc2) is always streaming VODs and if your in the mood for something a bit less serious but none the less great casting; BasetradeTV has all their vods available on twitch for your viewing pleasure.

FYI my definition of sport is: An activity that conforms to an arbitrary set of rules for no good reason, that allows for competition between two or more entities based on a specific skill or skill-set(which can be physical or mental).

By that measure, setting up startups through Y Combinator is a sport (unless you think there's a good reason and a lack of arbitrariness behind all the oddities of venture capital acquisition).

This is literally the exact definition of something that is not a sport. The word sport exists to delineate those activities from things like watching TV or playing video games.

What constitutes a sport though? By no sane definition could a bunch of over-paid and questionably dressed twits taking 3 or 4 tries at whacking a tiny ball into a hole 300 yards away be reasonably considered to be a sport, but yet Golf is a sport.

Arguably there is less physical activity in some accepted sports, such as Snooker or Darts, than there is in the frantic key presses and constant unblinking attention required to compete in a StarCraft tournament. And there is definitely an equal level of skill and dedication.

eSports should probably be thought of in the same manner as professional Chess e.g. A Mind Sport. Just because the game doesn't have hundreds of years of history behind it, it doesn't make it any less valid.

Still, if we are calling things not a sport because we don't like them then add Golf to the list. F*** them and their silly trousers.

Not exactly a Mind Sport either, since mechanical skills do play a major part in e-sports.

I was really happy how well Blizzcon went for SC2. The stage, production, and casting all were top notch. The list of players was the tip top of Korean SC2 with numerous GSL/SSL/Blizzcon winners. The matches were good. Some of the matchups (Innovation vs Life) ended up not fully living up to the hype, but in general all the series were very good.

The hype of holding the tournament immediately before the release of LotV was smart from Blizzard. I played SC2 HotS all the way through to the release of LotV, and the increase in player base at LotV launch was easily noticeable (it would have increased with LotV release regardless of Blizzcon but it likely helped).

Now is as good a time as any to get into watching SC2. With LotV release, the game focuses on micro in engagements much more than previously. This should make battles that would clearly be won by 1 player due to army sizes in HotS, now can be won by either side depending on micro. Also, with the large economy changes from HotS to LotV, the game is much less "figured out" than HotS was. It will be cool seeing how pro players stabilize on a meta game of standard builds in LotV in the coming year.

The squabble about whether e-sports are really "sports" or not is so boring. Who cares? They have similarities with physical/traditional sports, and they have dissimilarities.

The meaning of words IS important, but this debate is just trivial.

It's not just trivial, it's irrelevant. Words and definitions change, with the rise of a viable way to watch people play games competitively sport now covers competitive gaming because it's the most reasonable and simple word to cover it.

That said, this was an awesome write up, I'd love to see more discussions of competitions and write ups of some of the big match ups done in this style. It feels very insightful and great for getting a sort of simplified or easily understood view into the games!

The squabble about whether e-sports are really "sports" or not is so boring. Who cares? They have similarities with physical/traditional sports, and they have dissimilarities.

The meaning of words IS important, but this debate is just trivial.

It's not just trivial, it's irrelevant. Words and definitions change, with the rise of a viable way to watch people play games competitively sport now covers competitive gaming because it's the most reasonable and simple word to cover it.

That said, this was an awesome write up, I'd love to see more discussions of competitions and write ups of some of the big match ups done in this style. It feels very insightful and great for getting a sort of simplified or easily understood view into the games!

I agree, and I suppose you more precisely expressed what I was thinking. I also agree this was a great write up! I'd enjoy seeing more pieces of this sort.

This is literally the exact definition of something that is not a sport. The word sport exists to delineate those activities from things like watching TV or playing video games.

What constitutes a sport though? By no sane definition could a bunch of over-paid and questionably dressed twits taking 3 or 4 tries at whacking a tiny ball into a hole 300 yards away be reasonably considered to be a sport, but yet Golf is a sport.

Arguably there is less physical activity in some accepted sports, such as Snooker or Darts, than there is in the frantic key presses and constant unblinking attention required to compete in a StarCraft tournament. And there is definitely an equal level of skill and dedication.

eSports should probably be thought of in the same manner as professional Chess e.g. A Mind Sport. Just because the game doesn't have hundreds of years of history behind it, it doesn't make it any less valid.

Still, if we are calling things not a sport because we don't like them then add Golf to the list. F*** them and their silly trousers.

I think there's a pretty simple test for what is or is not a sport: can you perform at a competitive level, and smoke a cigarette at the same time? If so, not a sport. It's a vast oversimplification, but it's served me well.

The squabble about whether e-sports are really "sports" or not is so boring. Who cares? They have similarities with physical/traditional sports, and they have dissimilarities.

The meaning of words IS important, but this debate is just trivial.

It's not just trivial, it's irrelevant. Words and definitions change, with the rise of a viable way to watch people play games competitively sport now covers competitive gaming because it's the most reasonable and simple word to cover it.

That said, this was an awesome write up, I'd love to see more discussions of competitions and write ups of some of the big match ups done in this style. It feels very insightful and great for getting a sort of simplified or easily understood view into the games!

But the word sport has a cultural heritage that conveys universal values.I don't agree to call Starcraft sport because the client is proprietary and owned be a single entity. There is no other sport that require people to pay a single entity to play. Chess can be played with a board and pieces. Soccer\football can be played with a ball and a field. Starcraft can be played with a computer, a license to play the game delivered by Blizzard and an online account on Blizzard servers. I think calling that sport dillutes the value of the word while advertizing for a proprietary game. I wouldn't mind calling it sport if the protocol was open. I don't mind calling robot contests a sport. I have an issue with calling a game that requires a license to play a sport.

Suddenly, Life realised something: sOs had managed to build up behind his defences while he had expended everything on his follow-up attack. He barely had any expansions. He had no improved units or technology. He'd had sOs swaying on his feet, but sOs hadn't fallen down, and now Life had nothing left.

I found this really difficult to parse, with "he" seeming to be sOs. A bunch of possible tweaks could help, even just a comma before "while."

Of course, no one else has commented on this rather important paragraph yet, so it's probably just me. More coffee!

The squabble about whether e-sports are really "sports" or not is so boring. Who cares? They have similarities with physical/traditional sports, and they have dissimilarities.

The meaning of words IS important, but this debate is just trivial.

It's not just trivial, it's irrelevant. Words and definitions change, with the rise of a viable way to watch people play games competitively sport now covers competitive gaming because it's the most reasonable and simple word to cover it.

That said, this was an awesome write up, I'd love to see more discussions of competitions and write ups of some of the big match ups done in this style. It feels very insightful and great for getting a sort of simplified or easily understood view into the games!

But the word sport has a cultural heritage that conveys universal values.I don't agree to call Starcraft sport because the client is proprietary and owned be a single entity. There is no other sport that require people to pay a single entity to play. Chess can be played with a board and pieces. Soccer\football can be played with a ball and a field. Starcraft can be played with a computer, a license to play the game delivered by Blizzard and an online account on Blizzard servers. I think calling that sport dillutes the value of the word while advertizing for a proprietary game. I wouldn't mind calling it sport if the protocol was open. I don't mind calling robot contests a sport. I have an issue with calling a game that requires a license to play a sport.

I think that's an interesting point, but I think it speaks more to the values we ought to encourage in the adoption and proliferation of various 'sports' rather than to the appropriate boundaries of the term.

I was a fanatical Star Craft player back in the day - even cracking the top 10 ladder rankings before they opened up the US servers to the global audience and the Koreans came in and kicked all our butts.

I was never able to put the time in to get even decent at Star Craft II, or follow it much, but I found this line interesting:

Quote:

Heart of the Swarm introduced a number of new units that had the effect of making the game boring and frustrating to players and spectators.

Can anyone (author?) explain which units these were and how they made the game boring? Or perhaps point me in the direction of a resource? I'm curious.

Swarm hosts, from the zerg, literally created games that could go on for over an hour. I think the record was in the hour and a half region. About thirty to forty minutes of that, at least, is watching an endless wave of units (swarm hosts spawned infinite numbers of timed units back then) smash into each other. It was funny every now and then, but it got boring.

I wouldn't say the beginning of Heart of the Swarm was bad though. At the time, it brought SC2 to better heights than WoL. I loved StarCraft II back then, and I still do. Around mid 2014 (when I quit), I perceived a loooot of my friends stopping as well. That was about a year after Heart of the Swarm came out iirc. Before then, I'd probably played sc2 several days a week since the wings of liberty beta back in 2010.

Still, the author is pretty spot on. StarCraft, while imo its the most difficult competition in any video game (which is subjective and not a fight in trying to start) simply wasn't casual or casual viewer friendly. That really hurt its chances. Legacy of the Void is awesome though, and it might succeed in getting some small, constant audience for it. It will never be LoL popular, but it might manage to keep its niche.

The squabble about whether e-sports are really "sports" or not is so boring. Who cares? They have similarities with physical/traditional sports, and they have dissimilarities.

The meaning of words IS important, but this debate is just trivial.

It's not just trivial, it's irrelevant. Words and definitions change, with the rise of a viable way to watch people play games competitively sport now covers competitive gaming because it's the most reasonable and simple word to cover it.

That said, this was an awesome write up, I'd love to see more discussions of competitions and write ups of some of the big match ups done in this style. It feels very insightful and great for getting a sort of simplified or easily understood view into the games!

But the word sport has a cultural heritage that conveys universal values.I don't agree to call Starcraft sport because the client is proprietary and owned be a single entity. There is no other sport that require people to pay a single entity to play. Chess can be played with a board and pieces. Soccer\football can be played with a ball and a field. Starcraft can be played with a computer, a license to play the game delivered by Blizzard and an online account on Blizzard servers. I think calling that sport dillutes the value of the word while advertizing for a proprietary game. I wouldn't mind calling it sport if the protocol was open. I don't mind calling robot contests a sport. I have an issue with calling a game that requires a license to play a sport.

Okay, that's fine, don't call it a sport, but that doesn't mean that others can't or shouldn't.

Without looking it up (I'm at work, most sports sites/information is blocked) I would bet money that all of the teams playing professional soccer and probably chess are associated with some sort of organization that requires fees to play in their tournaments/competitive groups.

In soccer you'll also have to pay for the equipment to play the game, which isn't too different from needing to buy the license. Further, I don't know how calling it a sport advertises for anything proprietary because most of us who classify it under sports are classifying them all as sports, yes if someone gets into it they'll need to pay an initial entry fee to play, but it's generally pretty one time. Besides, there are plenty of online games that have high level tournament play that don't require payment to play, DoTA and LoL for example.

The squabble about whether e-sports are really "sports" or not is so boring. Who cares? They have similarities with physical/traditional sports, and they have dissimilarities.

The meaning of words IS important, but this debate is just trivial.

It's not just trivial, it's irrelevant. Words and definitions change, with the rise of a viable way to watch people play games competitively sport now covers competitive gaming because it's the most reasonable and simple word to cover it.

That said, this was an awesome write up, I'd love to see more discussions of competitions and write ups of some of the big match ups done in this style. It feels very insightful and great for getting a sort of simplified or easily understood view into the games!

But the word sport has a cultural heritage that conveys universal values.I don't agree to call Starcraft sport because the client is proprietary and owned be a single entity. There is no other sport that require people to pay a single entity to play. Chess can be played with a board and pieces. Soccer\football can be played with a ball and a field. Starcraft can be played with a computer, a license to play the game delivered by Blizzard and an online account on Blizzard servers. I think calling that sport dillutes the value of the word while advertizing for a proprietary game. I wouldn't mind calling it sport if the protocol was open. I don't mind calling robot contests a sport. I have an issue with calling a game that requires a license to play a sport.

I think that's an interesting point, but I think it speaks more to the values we ought to encourage in the adoption and proliferation of various 'sports' rather than to the appropriate boundaries of the term.

I think that's an interesting point, but I think it speaks more to the values we ought to encourage in the adoption and proliferation of various 'sports' rather than to the appropriate boundaries of the term.

bit. Additionally, I think you could make an argument that StarCraft code (or Lol, or whatever) provides the 'rules' of the game, and the hardware upon which it is run is the equipment.

Edited to add: On reflection, the "(excluding proprietary games such as arena football)" may be intended to note that such games are excluded from the definition of 'sport' by dint of their single supplier of equipment. Difficult to parse clearly. Anyway, I stand by the idea that the game code is the rules, and the hardware used to enact those rules on the 'field of play' is the equipment within the context of this definition.

Also, I think it's a pretty silly distinction wrt whether an activity is a sport or not. But now I've allowed myself to be drawn into the argument I just declared boring and trivial. =/

The squabble about whether e-sports are really "sports" or not is so boring. Who cares? They have similarities with physical/traditional sports, and they have dissimilarities.

The meaning of words IS important, but this debate is just trivial.

It's not just trivial, it's irrelevant. Words and definitions change, with the rise of a viable way to watch people play games competitively sport now covers competitive gaming because it's the most reasonable and simple word to cover it.

That said, this was an awesome write up, I'd love to see more discussions of competitions and write ups of some of the big match ups done in this style. It feels very insightful and great for getting a sort of simplified or easily understood view into the games!

But the word sport has a cultural heritage that conveys universal values.I don't agree to call Starcraft sport because the client is proprietary and owned be a single entity. There is no other sport that require people to pay a single entity to play. Chess can be played with a board and pieces. Soccer\football can be played with a ball and a field. Starcraft can be played with a computer, a license to play the game delivered by Blizzard and an online account on Blizzard servers. I think calling that sport dillutes the value of the word while advertizing for a proprietary game. I wouldn't mind calling it sport if the protocol was open. I don't mind calling robot contests a sport. I have an issue with calling a game that requires a license to play a sport.

I think that's an interesting point, but I think it speaks more to the values we ought to encourage in the adoption and proliferation of various 'sports' rather than to the appropriate boundaries of the term.

There is also an awful lot of cultural baggage in talking about what is or is not a sport. For example, I used to fence (epee for the win!) competitively in college. Here in the US, fencing is often seen as not even a sport while it is widely followed sport in France and other places in Europe. Similarly, poker is seen as a sport by some in the US and even shows up on ESPN -- yet badminton is not. And then there's hunting ...

To me, what defines a sport is the level of effort that is put in by the participants. That is, an activity in which you focus on improving your skills so that you can successfully compete with other people (who have also been focusing on improving their skills in that same activity) is a sport. The important part is 'competing against other people'. Without some aspect of competition, it is not a sport.

This is literally the exact definition of something that is not a sport. The word sport exists to delineate those activities from things like watching TV or playing video games.

What constitutes a sport though? By no sane definition could a bunch of over-paid and questionably dressed twits taking 3 or 4 tries at whacking a tiny ball into a hole 300 yards away be reasonably considered to be a sport, but yet Golf is a sport.

Arguably there is less physical activity in some accepted sports, such as Snooker or Darts, than there is in the frantic key presses and constant unblinking attention required to compete in a StarCraft tournament. And there is definitely an equal level of skill and dedication.

eSports should probably be thought of in the same manner as professional Chess e.g. A Mind Sport. Just because the game doesn't have hundreds of years of history behind it, it doesn't make it any less valid.

Still, if we are calling things not a sport because we don't like them then add Golf to the list. F*** them and their silly trousers.

Also, skeet and trap are *Olympic* sports and they're basically video games (with shotguns instead of electronics, but still).